


Like I’m Drowning, and You’re My Air

by FinAmour



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Bisexual John Watson, Clueless John, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Inexperienced Sherlock, Jealous John, Kissing in the Rain, Love Confessions, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining Idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-17 11:06:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18964006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FinAmour/pseuds/FinAmour
Summary: How is it that Sherlock Holmes, who knows an awful lot, has never known something as simple as a kiss?How is it that nobody has ever taken him by the collar of his poncy coat, pressed him against a wall, and kissed him, firmly and soundly? How is it that nobody in the universe has learned the flavour of his tongue, or felt the soft hum of his enthusiasm against their lips?It’s quite the injustice, and it’s driving John mad.





	Like I’m Drowning, and You’re My Air

**Author's Note:**

  * For [signsofthree](https://archiveofourown.org/users/signsofthree/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [Like I’m Drowning, and You’re My Air](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19816372) by [Acedia0106](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acedia0106/pseuds/Acedia0106)



> “The way you feel when you kiss him for the first time:  
> Like fire within your bones,  
> Like your soul has returned to the water,  
> Like every part of you that came from a dead star is alive again.”  
> —Nikita Gill

John Watson is thirteen years old when he kisses someone for the first time. 

Her name is Heather, and she’s a year his senior, and she has light hair and freckled skin and lip gloss that tastes like orange sherbet.

John thinks it means he’s her boyfriend, so he writes her letters telling her that she’s prettier than the sunshine, and that they can hold hands if she wants to, and that he’ll treat her so much better than that sod, Nick Parker.

Heather doesn’t write John back, and a week later, she's holding hands with Nick Parker again, and kissing him with her orange sherbet lips.

John chalks it up to his own inexperience.

***

Now, John is thirty-eight years old, and has kissed more women and men than he can count. But there are times he still doesn’t really know the true message behind a kiss.

Is it “I love you” or is it “I want you,” and does the meaning hold true for a lifetime, or only for a night? Does a kiss mean love, or is it more? Does a kiss mean love, or is it less?

John is thirty-eight, and leaning against a large dumpster in a small London alleyway when he learns that Sherlock Holmes is thirty-four and has never been kissed.

Sherlock’s not expressly concerned.

“Aren’t you worried you’ll never learn, though?” John asks as the putrid scent of rubbish wafts through the hot summer air.

“Never learn what?” Sherlock casually replies. It’s probably been fifteen minutes since the conversation had come to a close.

“You know. The kissing thing.”

Sherlock turns his head to face John, furrowing his brow. “It’s not high on my list of priorities.” He’s clearly done talking about it.

John’s not. “What if there’s a certain, I don’t know, age, and once you’ve passed that age, you’ll never be fluent in kissing?”

Sherlock crinkles his forehead and chuckles. “Like learning a language?”

“Yeah, sort of like that, I suppose.”

Sherlock shakes his head. “Don’t be ridiculous, John,” he says, and then there’s a rustle from the other side of the dumpster. “Did you hear that?” He doesn’t wait for a response before dashing into the alleyway to pursue the sound, and John is close behind.

John thinks about kissing for the rest of that evening, even when they find the criminal and handcuff him and turn him in to Lestrade.

John thinks about kissing the next day at the clinic, and he thinks about kissing the day after that.

He can’t seem to stop.

Especially when Sherlock looks at him like _that;_ andruns his fingers over his mouth like _that_ , and especially when his lips are heart-shaped and pink like cotton candy and full and beautiful like _that._

How is it that Sherlock Holmes, who knows an awful lot, has never known something as simple as a kiss?

How is it that nobody has ever taken him by the collar of his poncy coat, pressed him against a wall, and kissed him, firmly and soundly? How is it that nobody in the universe has learned the flavour of his tongue, or felt the soft hum of his enthusiasm against their lips?

It’s quite the injustice, and it’s driving John mad.

 ***

“Aren’t you the slightest bit curious?” John asks one morning (six days later), as the two of them are drinking tea.

“Yes, generally,” Sherlock responds, curled up in his armchair and browsing the web for blood coagulation techniques. “However, it depends. To what are you referring?”

“You know.” John clears his throat and doesn’t look up from the newspaper. “The kissing thing.”

He can feel Sherlock’s gaze lift to him. “...What?”

“You don’t even want to know what it feels like?” John asks, his tone heroically casual.

Sherlock drums his fingers rhythmically against the arm of his chair. “No.”

“Well,” John says. “That’s too bad, because it’s actually quite amazing.”

“So is cocaine,” Sherlock retorts. “Shall I call my dealer?”

John rips his eyes from the newspaper, trying to determine whether Sherlock is serious.

Sherlock’s expression is blank.

“No,” John replies.

“And why not?”

“Because! Kissing isn’t...dangerous, Sherlock.”

Sherlock finally flashes the tiniest grin. “Isn’t it? Kissing may lead to feelings of sentimental attachment, which are quite a threat to one’s sanity.”

John frowns at him. “ _You’re_ a threat to _my_ sanity,” he mutters, and glances back down at the newspaper.

Sherlock grumbles something under his breath, but John suddenly can’t hear anything at all.

***

“Perhaps you should ask Molly,” John suggests one afternoon in the lab at Bart’s while Sherlock examines the digestive system of a corpse.

“Ask her about what?” Sherlock doesn’t look up from the bowels in his hands.

“You know. The kissing thing.”

Sherlock’s eyes fall closed, and he inhales with what John can only guess is annoyance and an effort not to drop the bowels. “And why, John, would I do that?”

John shuffles his feet, his eyes falling on the corpse’s spleen. “I mean, she could help you. She clearly fancies you, and I’m sure she’d kiss you, if you asked.”

Sherlock‘s forehead crinkles with annoyance. “No.”

“And why not?”

“It would be cruel; kissing someone who has a romantic attachment to me, when I don’t feel the same way.”

John feels something swelling in his chest, something akin to relief, but he doesn’t overthink it. “Of course.”

“And besides, John,” Sherlock continues casually. “As I’ve said before, women aren’t really my area.”

“You have mentioned that.” John’s face is burning. “But I’m afraid I don’t know exactly what it means.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. “Really? Isn’t it obvious, John? I’m gay.”

John’s heart flutters.“Oh,” is all he says. “Yeah, ha. Of course.”

But his brain is screaming something altogether different.

***

“There may be an app for it, you know,” John states one evening over Thai curry. “They make an app for everything these days.”

Sherlock frowns, bringing his chopsticks to his (pretty pink heart-shaped) mouth. “An app for what?”

“You know,” John says. “The kissing thing.”

Sherlock stops eating and sets his box of takeout onto the coffee table. “John.”

“Yeah?”

“You are honestly so obsessed with the idea of my kissing someone that you’re suggesting I kiss a stranger?”

John sighs. _No._ “Sure!”

Sherlock is still frowning. “Why does it bother you so? The fact that I’ve never been kissed?”

John chuckles nervously. “You’re my mate, Sherlock. Mates want the best for each other, right? It simply isn’t right that you’ve never been kissed. You ought to know what it’s like.”

Sherlock looks him in the eye, and John can feel himself sweating as he pins him with his gaze. “Alright, then.”

“What?”

“If it will make you feel better; if it will make you stop talking about it, I will use an app, and I will find a stranger to kiss.”

John gulps. “Good.”

Sherlock nods and returns to his Masaman curry.

***

A few hours later, Sherlock shows his mobile phone to John. “How about this one?”

John glares. “Really? No way. He’s _old.”_

“He’s thirty-six.”

“His hair is completely white.”

Sherlock removes his phone from John’s view. “Does that somehow affect his ability to kiss?”

John repositions himself in his armchair. “No. But swipe left anyway.”

Sherlock shakes his head. “Fine. What about _him?”_ He holds his phone up to John once more.

“Ugh.”

“What?”

“He’s _Irish.”_

“So?”

“He’ll probably… get you drunk on Guinness and try to convince you that leprechauns are real, or something.”

Sherlock rubs his temples. “You’re ridiculous. And I fail to see why I require you to approve of this person, anyway. I’m simply going to choose, and you’re going to have to deal with it.”

John sighs deeply. “Fine.”

***

Sherlock eventually settles for some bloke from Soho, and John knows nothing about him, except that he hates him a lot. 

He tries to ignore Sherlock as he gets ready for the date one evening; perfecting his curls and putting on the white silk button up and applying the after-shave that John has smelled every day since they met, though he’s only _now_ realising how much he loves it.

“How do I look?” Sherlock asks John as he steps into the sitting room at half past seven.

John gazes up at him, a lump forming in his throat. “You look…”

_Like the most beautiful person on the planet._

_So gorgeous, it physically hurts me._

_Like a work of art._

“...kissable,” he finally replies.

Sherlock looks back at him, as if he’s somewhat surprised by the answer. “Alright. Good.”

John nods and smiles, and Sherlock walks towards the door, puts his coat on silently, and reaches out towards the door handle.

John doesn’t know what he’s feeling right now. He just knows he doesn’t want Sherlock to…

“Sherlock?” He clears his throat and looks up at him.

“Yes?” Sherlock turns his head.

John stares at him, with so much to say, none of which, he’s sure, Sherlock wants to hear. So he only says: “Have fun.”

Sherlock turns to go.

***

After Sherlock leaves, John sits silently in 221B, though his head is a mess of very loud, very confusing thoughts.

Rain begins to pour unexpectedly against the window pane.

“Sherlock doesn’t have an umbrella,” John says aloud, for some reason, reckoning he can catch up with him before he gets too far. He flies out the door and down the stairwell, grabbing an umbrella on his way. He flings open the front door, and runs outside into the pouring rain, and—

“John.”

Sherlock’s standing right there, at the bottom of the front steps, soaked from head to toe and gazing up at John with amusement.

“It’s raining,” John says.

“Is it? I hadn’t noticed.”

John steps down and next to Sherlock, facing him, and he holds the umbrella over the both of their heads. “I brought you an umbrella.”

Sherlock smiles at him, and the corners of his eyes crinkle, and John’s heart races. “I would have been fine without it,” he says.

John rolls his eyes. “A simple _thank you_ would have sufficed.”

Sherlock’s smile grows, and they are standing so close that John can feel Sherlock’s short, irregular breaths on his face.

The rain cascades over them.

“Shouldn’t you, erm...Get going?” John asks.

Sherlock presses his lips together. “The man I was meeting just sent me a text message to cancel.”

John feels a gigantic wave of relief surging through his body, and he hopes the resulting smile on his face isn’t as obvious as it feels.

“I suppose I won’t be getting kissed after all,” Sherlock says, his eyes searching John’s face.

“No…” John swallows. “I suppose not.”

An expression of what seems like disappointment flashes over Sherlock’s features.

“I could, erm…” John fumbles. “I could tell you what it’s like, maybe. Perhaps that would be good enough for now.”

Sherlock regards John thoughtfully. “Alright. Tell me, then.”

As he begins to speak, John feels the gravity of Sherlock pulling him closer, and he doesn’t try fighting it. “Kissing is like… it’s like when you’re drowning, and the other person is your air. Kissing is like solving a puzzle after searching centuries for the final piece. Kissing is like a bridge of energy shared between two people, where time stops and all you can feel is the beating of the other person’s heart.” 

Sherlock’s arms are around John’s waist, and John’s arms are around Sherlock’s shoulders, their bodies basking in the warmth of one another.

“Sounds quite pleasant, I must admit,” Sherlock says.

“It really is,” John agrees.

The rain continues to pour around them.

“John?”

“Yeah?”

“Suppose you were to kiss me. How would you do it?”

John feels as though every cell in his body is suddenly screaming.

“Softly,” he murmurs.

“Yeah?” Their lips are so close that they are practically brushing together.

John gulps. “And I would kiss you like you were the most precious thing on Earth. And I would make sure you felt safe, and valued, and—and also, loved.”

Sherlock pauses. “Am I?”

John’s nose bumps against his. “You are. But Sherlock, I... I don’t know if this is a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m not sure that you feel the same way about me as I feel about you.”

Sherlock squeezes John’s waist. “How do you feel about me, John?”

John squeezes back. “I feel...” He takes a breath. “I feel like I want to kiss you.”

“Then you’re wrong,” Sherlock states. “Because that means we feel the same.”

John smiles as he closes the distance between their lips. And as they kiss, right in front of Baker Street, holding one another in the pouring rain, John finally understands what it all means:

_Against all odds, you’ve found me, and I’ve found you. And you’re meant to be here, with me, in this very moment. You’re meant to be kissing me, and I’m meant to be kissing you, and so it will be for as long as we both have hearts and mouths._

***

Decades later, when Sherlock and John are both in their eighties, they have kissed one another thousands of times.

Every kiss, however, still feels like the first.  

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I’m @fin__amour on Twitter...come say hi!


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